Shandray is, of course, Sarah Douglas, who helped make this movie and "Superman II" and "Quest of the Delta Knights" and "Conan the Destroyer" that much more painful. Tug was played by a DeLuise, and we all know what THAT name means...more PAIN!

Well, well, well... If it isn't the "Hootie & the Blowfish" of the Sci-Fi movie industry... I don't know about any of you people, but if I was imprisoned in a rough'n'tough orphanage facility in the middle of the desert, I would NOT try to gain any respectability by naming my gang, "Solarbabies". End of discussion.

&#65279;From the moment SolarBabies opened with a man’s wise voice telling of thedestruction and dehydration of Earth, I told myself that it couldn’t possibly get worse.That was until a pre-teen dressed in orphan rags skated down a desert slope shortlyfollowed by a hockey team sharing the movie’s ludicrous name. The film had sunk into ahilariously feeble attempt at sci-fi and the only way to bear the rest would be to laugh atany pathetic sense of seriousness that came along.

SolarBabies’ plot was stupid, unbelievable, and for the most part unoriginal. Whatlittle originality there was, wasn’t in the main plot, but in how they had managed to fitsuch idiotic scenes together to form a movie without adding surreal, psychedelic effectsto it like so many 60s movies have done. Obviously, SolarBabies was meant to be takenin the utmost gravity. It was “dramatic” and “poetic” at all the wrong moments and scenesmoved too swiftly without showing logical reasoning behind each action (although,thankfully, that spares the audience from watching one moronic scene for a tedious 15minutes). And, as in every movie of its genre, the end was accompanied by a victoriousrevenge fight scene in which the heros kill, or at least seriously injure, all who have donethem wrong. The plot, if one at all exists, is surely not the highlight of the movie.

Originality wasn’t much better. Although the entire film consisted of one clicheafter another, some were more memorable than others. For instance, a group of boys whohappen to play hockey are favored by a cop over another group (why, it’s West Side Storyall over again!). Mist would also appear out of nowhere at the most “powerful” moments.Perhaps that would work well near a water source (i.e, Lake, ocean, swamp, etc.) but it’snot very successful in a desert.

The movie isn’t exactly brilliant with cinematography either. It’s colorless, bland,and mediocre. Any special effects that happen by are pathetic: The magical orb/spheresparkles while flying—very high-tech . . . Not.

Acting and dialog could easily fit into one category since neither of them reallyexists. Either it was the actors who made the dialog horrible or vice versa. Or perhapsthey were both just horrendous. All together it was shallow, monotonous, and transparent.The jokes came out lame, happiness was obviously faked and the metaphors, which werevery simple to begin with, were all too clear. Somehow I don’t think SolarBabiesacquired any Oscars in Best Script/Actor/Actress.

I have to admit, the part that really shocked me was music and sound. I had heardthat the composer who did it was fairly talented but when the credits opened and amixture of Richard Strauss and Star Wars blared through the TV, it couldn’t have beenmore opposite. It was almost frightening in its stupidity: Complete with Happy-Go-Lucky, Let’s-All-Rejoice dancing songs, eerie space noises, and freaky 80s “music”inserted at random intervals. The background music during dialog reminded meamazingly of elevators. All in all, SolarBabies is as laughable as its name.

I love this movie. I watched it over and over again when I was little and I just bought it to watch over and over again now. But then again I love bad eighties movies like "Howard the Duck" and "Moonwalker" too!

OOps. Yeah so It seems like a common story now, upon reading these reviews. I too saw this movie many times as a child, and have since been trying to remember it's name, actors, or anything concrete about the film besides the fabulous, inspiring plot. I have faced ridicule from my peers who would not believe in it's existence. They called me crazy but like a true solarbaby I persevered against impossible odds. And now at last, I will have in my possession proof of my sanity (if not my good taste)! Common skeptics, don't be so serious, this film freakin rocks. Where else do you find ecowarriors on roller skates hanging out with glowing orbs? I rest my case in the sheer and utter brilliance of bodhi the bodhisattva mahasattva (sp).

Like a few of the other people here, I saw this film when I was nine.Sure the movie has some outlandish scenarios and loops in it's plot but I don't see anyone knocking Han christian anderson or the brothers grimm or even Mother goose for that sort of thing.What about this thing called a " willing suspension of disbelief" without it no enjoyment can be had from any sort of story, fiction or otherwise.It's that suspension that allows the imagination to play and to fill in blanks .The special effects for a low budget movie in the 80's was exemplary for the time and I'd much rather enjoy the theatricality of a laser beam garage door opener than an invisible infra red one, ( it got my mind racing )and even as adult it's admittedly still more engaging than the reality.You can hear the spaceships exploding in space in Star wars and yet it's common knowledge that there is no sound in outerspace.Kids can't drive but we can have skates or bikes and for a long treck some form of transportation is necessary.I was inspired to take up rollerskating from it, and that proved more fun than pretending a cardboard box was a car not to mention it got me outdoors enjoying myself instead of vegging out on cartoons and cheap cereal.It was also touching to see a story aimed at kids that had big and little kids of differing backgrounds overcoming differences and trying to remain postive, spirited and hopeful in a world that had so little promise. Today we have teeny movies of over primped,over priveledged, prissy teenboppers who are just bored, cynical, self absorbed, and desperate for peer approval who resort to copying from glossy magazines a lifestyle dictated to them by people who only care about their pocket books. They can't appreciate anything because they've gotten everything too easily resulting in stunted imagination and lack of drive. There is still only one black boy or one black girl around and the character of "Rabbit" to this day is still treated with far more dignity than contemporary versions. Oscar material this movie isn't;nor was it mean't to be.It was a flight of fantasy. It got my imagination going.In real life people in desperate situations often do gravitate to happy escapism it's what you do when you need a will to survive." Solarbabies" as a team name in such a place isn't so farfetched and I would know I've been to some desperate places and see what people do to keep going.It was inspiring, not banal,but necessarily elementary and yet VERY engaging and responsibly mindful of it's INTENDED audience.There are more hopeful and redeeming qualities in this film than many an oscar contender and my life was richer for having seen it as a child as opposed to making them richer from the currently inevitable torrent of merchandise that would have accompanied it nowadays.